Three #1 seeds made it to the Sweet 16, obviously not including Kansas. Out of Kentucky, Duke and Syracuse, it seemed to me that the Orange had the unique style of play, experience and solid coaching to emerge as the new favorite with the Jayhawks out of the tournament. Wrong. The Butler Bulldogs met Syracuse in Salt Lake City and showed them who the more fundamentally sound team was. Syracuse outshot and outrebounded Butler, but had 18 turnovers to the Bulldogs' 7, and lost the game. For the season, Butler was averaging something like 5 steals per game, but had 13 in this contest. The Bulldogs had been getting it done by holding teams to a poor shooting percentage rather than turning them over, but in this game both were the case. Some stupid analyst said if Onuaku would have played, Syracuse's turnovers would not have been so high because, naturally, their starting center is the premier ball handler. This was the first of many entertaining/shocking Sweet 16 games.
Yeah, reminds me of Bob Cousy in his prime...
Approximately thirty minutes after the Butler upset, Kansas St. and Xavier tipped off, except Xavier did not come to play. Kansas St. got out to a 19-4 lead before Jordan Crawford could even remember who he dunked on. Xavier called some timeouts to get the troops rallied, and they sure as hell turned it around. Amazingly, the Musketeers were up 32-31 at halftime, but Mr. Second Half, Jacob Pullen, was lurking. Roberto Denis Clemente seemed to be the first half guy, and Pullen seemed to be the second half. If Clemente were the starter, Pullen would definitely be the closer.
Get the idea?
The second half was neck and neck up until then end when Kansas St. was up three with about ten seconds to play. The Wildcats attempted to intentionally foul the Xavier point guard Terrell Holloway as he crossed half court, but he was in the act of shooting so the Musketeers got three foul shots, and the kid drained them all. After Kansas St. missed, the game went into overtime. Let me just say that in overtime, it was some of the greatest shot making I have seen in a long time. Clemente, Holloway, Pullen and Crawford were making every shot they needed to, including a deep deep deep three by Crawford to send it into a second overtime. In the second overtime, Xavier went cold and Kansas St. pulled it out, but you could tell that they were hella tired. Clemente, for instance, played 48 minutes out of the 50. The question was if it would affect the team with their matchup with Butler in two days...
Nah, probably not.
If you were not rooting for Butler on Saturday, your life is a waste. Lucas Oil Stadium, site of the FInal Four, is only six miles away from Butler's stadium and IT'S FREAKING BUTLER! If they were to make the Final Four, it would be George Mason-esque. As in the Xavier/Kansas St. game, Pullen was nowhere to be seen in the first half, but so was Clemente. The Wildcats had 20 total points in the first half and forward Curtis Kelly had like 12 of them. You could tell Butler's defense was focused on not letting either of Kansas St.'s super guards even breath on the offensive end, and the Bulldogs held a 27-20 lead at half. Clemente came out with a vengeance in the second half and brought the Wildcats back to tie the game, but Pullen remained quiet. The question wasn't "if" Pullen would hit a huge shot, but "when".
Quick question: Did Pullen even exist before this season? Bizarre.
But when it came down to the wire, Butler made the plays necessary to win the game and Kansas St. did not. Clemente hurt his ankle sometime in the second half and was noticeably limping around on the court, but still made a few good plays to keep Kansas St. in the game as long as possible. Pullen hit a few shots in the second half, but towards the end of the game the Wildcats did not have enough left in the tank to overcome Butler's solid team effort. Gordon Hayward, Butler's "star", stepped up with the game on the line and made some nice drives to the basket for layups. And Shelvin Mack, who as the point guard did not handle the ball very well throughout the game, made some clutch three pointers and sealed a trip to the Final Four for the Bulldogs.
No idea why you would get a trophy for winning your regional.
My favorite part of this game was when Len Elmore interviewed Butler's coach Brad Stevens (who looks like a 19 year old water boy) after the game. Elmore asked Stevens how it felt to be going back to Indy after the win, and Stevens responded by calmly stating "Well, we would have gone back to Indy with a win or a loss". Elmore was so stunned (clutch) and the Bulldogs cut down the nets in Salt Lake City. They will definitely be the sentimental favorites going forward to the final weekend, but can they actually do it?
Oh, the man himself.
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